Tuesday Top Ten: Oscar Fashion

Jose here, reporting for red carpet duty, and wishing I was half as cool as perennial nominee Sandy Powell (pictured left).

Full disclosure: I did not watch the Oscars on Sunday. I know, I know (I will be banished from TFE soon or burned at the stake later this week and you know what my last words will be) --  so all my red carpet knowledge is coming from pictures. If there was a fabulous dress that made an appearance during the ceremony I missed it, but expect you all to fill me in in the comments. Perhaps it was my general boredom with this particular awards season, or people taking less fashion risks than usual, but it was a lackluster affair when it came to most red carpets, and the Oscars were no different. Seriously, off the top of your head, can you come up with three or five iconic looks that people will be talking about for years to come, from this season? 

Without further ado, the ten best looks on Oscar night...

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Podcast: Favorite Past Films & Performances by this Year's Nominees

It's just Nathaniel and Nick for this week's podcast. We're talking at length about the toughest categories to predict as well as a reader suggestion (thanks Ryan!) to choose our favorite work by the current nominees before this season. 

43 minutes 
00:01 Introductions, Blind Spots, Foggy Memories
03:45 Iñárritu and The Revenant
09:00 George Miller plus Babe and Mad Max sequels
14:00 Tough Categories to Predict and Why
27:45 Best Actress - who is best?
30:00 Saoirse Ronan
31:17 Charlotte Rampling
34:15 Cate Blanchett
36:22 Brie Larson
38:00 Jennifer Lawrence

We discuss a lot of different titles obviously since we're choosing their best work before the current nomination. We'd love to hear your choices for this same question in the comments. You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. 

Previous Best Work - Actress/Directors

Birthday Beauty Break: Charlotte & Jennifer & Barbara & Laura

February 5th is a big day for Actress birthdays. Two of this year's Oscar nominees are celebrating birthdays today! How about that? Charlotte Rampling, Best Actress nominee, is 70 today and Jennifer Jason Leigh, Best Supporting Actress nominee, is 54. And to round out the 1-time nominee party, it's also Barbara Hershey's special day. She's 67.  Finally, since  The Lovely Laura Linney, turning 52, is one of our most beloved actresses we can't leave her out if we're talking Oscar love.  

HAPPY BIRTHDAY OSCAR BEAUTIES!

After the jump, I've selected 7 of their most important performances each (excluding current roles) and, to make it more fun, they're in chronological order so you can see how the careers overlap. Sound off on these beauties in the comments.

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Team Experience: Personal Favorite Oscar Nods

While I update the charts I asked the team to share their single favorite Oscar nomination of the day. And I hope you'll pick a single nomination to praise in the comments to. What most delighted you?

And now the favorite things hoopla begins... 

Mad Max: Fury Road - Best Picture
Back in May, critics and cinephiles, myself included, fell in love with Mad Max: Fury Road. It wasn’t just lust or infatuation. It was the kind of love that breeds doubt that others could see in the movie what we saw. Perhaps for that reason, a chorus of moans immediately went up about how not only is the Academy so often forgetful of Spring films, but that Mad Max was probably too fun, too action-y, too daring, hell, too feminist, for the academy to acknowledge it come Oscar season. Then, over the course of the summer, it didn’t even become the blockbuster many expected it would. Domestically speaking, it barely recouped its $150 million budget. (That may sound like a lot, but in the summer of “gigantosauri,” as Mark Harris called it, it was runtish.) How wonderful then today, to see a movie as exciting as it is smart get its due. - Kyle Stevens

Lenny Abrahamson, Room - Best Director
Every moment is so carefully considered. His touch is so gentle that he earns every tear he's coaxed out of us by patiently setting up character and context. He makes Room feel so big and the real world so oppressively small. You can feel that the film was constructed by someone with a deep well of compassion and a profound understanding of what presentation the story demands to impact us. I had hoped that he could make it in, but so rarely does the director's branch award solid quiet observation. - Chris Feil  

more after the jump... 

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Podcast Pt 2: Carol, 45 Years, Christmas Gifts, Etc...

For the second half of the holiday podcast Katey, Joe, Nathaniel, and Nick, name our favorite Christmas movies, hand out lumps of coals and Christmas gifts to our least and most favorite movie achievements. Let's jump right in! 

37 minutes 
00:01 Previously On...
01:00 Foreign & Docs & Shorts + Heart of a Dog and World of Tomorrow
06:50 Our ongoing Carol obsession
11:00 Favorite X-Mas movies: Home Alone, It's a Wonderful Life, etc
19:01 Lumps of Coal & Beautiful Gifts. Plus a long tangent for Tom Courtenay & Charlotte Rampling in 45 Years
30:25 Random Silliness & Goodbyes
34:00 "Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas"

Further Reading for Context:
Oscar Charts & Doc Finalists & Foreign Finalists 
Richard Lawson's Top 10
Nathaniel's 15 Worst
Decider's 'best movies that are only tangentially about Christmas'

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. 

Holiday Podcast Pt 2